Chuck Versus the Colonel
|next= }} Chuck Versus the Colonel is the twenty-first episode in Season Two, and aired on April 20, 2009. It is the thirty-fourth episode overall. Synopsis Chuck and Sarah go on the run in an effort to rescue his father, Stephen Bartowski. However, Casey has just been promoted to Colonel, and begins hunting the two down, as per his orders. Meanwhile at the Buy More, Morgan becomes a pariah among his coworkers after Big Mike's demotion. Full Plot Main Story The episode begins the morning after the previous episode. Chuck and Sarah head to the coordinates of Black Rock that Chuck had flashed on, but arrive only to find an abandoned drive-in theater. At Castle, Beckman promotes Casey to Colonel and orders him to bring Chuck and Sarah in, dead or alive. Meanwhile, Ted Roark demands Stephen finish the Intersect by the next morning, or else he'll kill his family. Unable to return home because they are AWOL, Chuck and Sarah stop to spend the night at a motel. Unknown to them, Vincent has tracked their location. Roark asks him to wait until the morning when the Intersect should be finished before dealing with them. After an altercation with Ellie and Devon while searching Chuck's room for clues as to where he and Sarah might have gone, Casey tracks a call placed by Chuck to the same motel. The next morning Chuck and Sarah wake up next to each other and begin making out, but are prevented from moving on to sex when Chuck discovers Morgan took his last condom. Chuck leaves to get one but is apprehended by Casey, but Sarah disables Casey and cuffs him to a radiator in the motel room. As they prepare to leave several Fulcrum operatives arrive and Chuck convinces Sarah to go back for Casey, who has already freed himself by tearing out the radiator and confronts Chuck at the car. Sarah is captured by Fulcrum but Chuck rescues her by running them down with their car. Casey takes them back into custody. Stephen is tracking them and as they pass the drive-in again leaves Chuck a message (Tron 12AM) on a billboard, but Casey refuses to turn back and returns them to Castle. Casey at least informs Beckman of the message, and she agrees to look into it. Casey's home alarm is tripped by Devon, and he hurries back to deal with him. Meanwhile, Chuck and Sarah talk while locked up and are about to kiss again when a short blackout (see below) disables the security and allows them to escape. They see Devon trapped in Casey's apartment on one of the monitors when power is restored and rush back home as well. Chuck and Sarah stop Casey from killing Devon and leave him tied up, while they return to the drive-in to rescue Stephen. Meanwhile, as Casey attempts to light his lighter to melt his bonds, Beckman appears on his TV, stating that there's not enough time to rescue Stephen, so she has instead decided to order an air strike to destroy the facility to prevent Fulcrum from gaining the Intersect. Casey escapes and goes after the rest of his team. He joins Sarah in freeing Stephen before the air strike arrives, however they are captured by Vincent. Chuck was told to stay in the car, but when a large group of Fulcrum agents arrive he realizes that Roark is going to use the completed Intersect to build an army, so leaves to stop it and snatch the cube. He encounters Roark, who brings all the prisoners into the projection booth. Chuck warns Sarah and Casey to close their eyes, but Stephen tells Chuck to leave his open. He does as his father instructs: Stephen had reprogrammed the Intersect to remove the data, not implant it. Roark finds this out when he doesn't flash on any of the pictures he's looking at. But before he could kill Chuck, Air Force F-16s arrive and begin attack runs on the base. The Fulcrum agents scatter and the team escapes, taking the Intersect with them. Back at Castle, Beckman commends Casey on rescuing Stephen, recovering the Intersect, and defeating the entirety of Fulcrum, but he deflects her praise and covers for Sarah by saying it was her idea to pretend going rogue to flush out Fulcrum. Beckman clears Sarah of wrongdoing, and announces their operation is over and Chuck is free to live out his life. Chuck tries to thank her but she cuts the transmission. The episode ends with a battered Ted Roark hitching a ride on a semi, headed for Ellie's wedding. Buy More Morgan is on the outs with the rest of his coworkers after Big Mike was removed as store manager by Emmett, who wants to make Morgan his assistant manager. Morgan initially refuses and tries to make things up to Big Mike. Eventually he accepts the promotion from Emmett and tries to use it to control Emmett's power plays by protecting Big Mike and the rest of the employees, however Emmett continues to force Mike into doing menial tasks around the store. After he's ordered to install new registers, Jeff and Lester set off a bomb they found in Casey's locker inside a generator outside the store, which causes a temporary blackout throughout Burbank. Morgan is ordered to fire them, which he tries to stop by asking the two to apologize, which they refuse to do. Anna confronts Morgan why he takes their abuse, and chides him about not having any dreams outside the Buy More. Morgan admits he wants to be a Benihana chef. Emmett continues to pressure Morgan to fire Jeff and Lester, until finally Morgan decides to do the honorable thing. He comes to Big Mike and asks him to take care of his mother, then in full view of everyone strips off his assistant manager's shirt and quits. He asks Anna to come with him to Hawaii while he follows his dream to train as a chef. He and Anna leave the store in style to thunderous applause of all his coworkers. Family Devon interrupts Casey's search of Chuck's room, (see above) but grows suspicious about his behavior and Chuck's disappearance. He heads to the Buy More to ask Jeff and Lester if they've seen Chuck, and about Casey. The two break into Casey's locker and reveal that Casey has keys to Chuck's house and keeps logs of his doings at the store, as well as chloroform and other disturbing equipment. Jeff expresses professional admiration for Casey as a stalker. Growing more concerned, Devon uses Casey's keys to break into his apartment, where he sees Casey's surveillance equipment, including the camera in Chuck's room. He tries to access Casey's computer but trips an alarm which locks him in. Casey, alerted to his intrusion, returns to his apartment. Devon confronts him about his intrusion into Chuck's privacy, and defends himself when Casey tries to kill him. Casey gets back to his feet, but before he can finish Devon off is ambushed by Sarah and Chuck. Devon insists on calling the police, but now that he's seen so much Chuck reluctantly tells him the truth--he's a high-profile government asset, and Sarah and Casey are his handlers. Chuck asks for Devon to "be awesome" and cover for him with Ellie. Devon is stunned, but agrees to help. Later, when Ellie comes home and asks him about Chuck, Devon begins to panic. Ellie mistakes this as wedding jitters and orders him to remain focused. He eventually calms down as they prepare to leave for their rehearsal dinner, and assures her that Chuck loves her and was just shaken up by their father leaving again. He asks her to trust Chuck, who finally returns home and apologizes, then brings Stephen in as their wedding present. As they all head out for the dinner, Chuck stops by Casey's apartment and asks him to come with them. Casey refuses, saying his mission is over, but Chuck tells him he's asking as a friend. Casey closes the door, but as Chuck turns to leave he comes back out with several cigars in-hand. Sarah then arrives as well and Casey leaves them to talk. Chuck is unable to believe that it's real, but Sarah assures him it is as she takes him by the hand. Guest Stars * Scott Bakula as Stephen Bartowski * Chevy Chase as Ted Roark * Bonita Friedericy as General Diane Beckman * Arnold Vosloo as Vincent Smith Trivia * The F-16s attacking the Fulcrum site seem to be armed strictly with AGM-65 Maverick missiles and yet are shown delivering a napalm strike at the end of their mission. Additionally, the F-16s have a tailcode of "HL" which would indicate that they are from the Hill Air Force Base in Utah. This seems a little far, but no air force base in California supports F-16s while Hill AB does indeed support F-16s. * The drive-in that Chuck and Sarah are at in the beginning of the episode is a likely reference to the abandoned drive-in in "Spies Like Us", which stared Chevy Chase and from which the show has frequent references. * Chevy Chase asking the crowd "can you dig it?" is a reference to Cyrus asking the same question to a group of gangs in the movie "The Warriors" (1979). * Morgan and Anna's departure is an homage to "An Officer and a Gentleman" (1982), when at the end Richard Gere's Zack does sweep Paula (Debra Winger) up and carry her off. Quotes Chuck: [Reading a note from Morgan] IOU one condom. Your pal, Morgan. Chuck: I'm gonna kill you Morgan! Casey: [Leaving Chuck and Sarah alone] I'll warm up the Vic. Music * Bon Iver – “Creature Fear” * Malbec – “The Answering Machine” * Bon Iver – “Team” Category:Season 2 Television Series Episodes